What We’re Reading: Continued Weinstein Fallout

It’s been three weeks since The New York Times and The New Yorker published their bombshell pieces alleging decades of sexual misconduct by Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein, and the media industry is still dealing with fallout.

The takedown of Weinstein, once one of Hollywood’s most feared and powerful players, along with the viral #MeToo campaign encouraging women to come forward with their own stories of sexual harassment, has lead to an industry-wide shakeup.

First, Harvey Weinstein continues to dominate headlines. As Hollywood actresses and executives continue to come forward with their own Weinstein encounters, Oscar-winning actress Lupita Nyong’o wrote a piece in The New York Times detailing her relationship with Weinstein.

Following accusations by dozens and dozens of women, Weinstein’s response to Nyong’o’s claims (one of the most prominent women of color to come forth so far) has some observers questioning how race plays a role in sexual assault and harassment stories. Read the Washington Post’s take.

Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times has been closely following the accusations against Hollywood executives; first at Amazon, where studio executive Roy Price was forced out of the company after multiple actresses accused him of sexual harassment, then Sunday, the paper released a story in which 38 women accused director James Toback of assault and abuse.

UPDATE: 38 women contacted me for this story. That number has now doubled since it was published. https://t.co/beVGHWGOKM

CNN has more on the Nickelodeon showrunner Chris Savino, creator of the animated program Loud House, who was fired Thursday in response to allegations of sexual harassment. The allegations included claims that he had threatened women who rejected his advances with professional retaliation. Savino’s actions may be representative of larger problems in the animation community; over 200 female and non-gender conforming animators released an open letter addressing rampant sexism in their field (Only 23% of guild members are female).

Problems persist at Fox News, following a report Saturday by The New York Times revealing that ex-host Bill O’Reilly settled a sexual harassment suit with one of the network’s legal analysts for $32 million — an extreme sum, given that the network was in talks to renew O’Reilly’s contract for $25 million a year.

Even millennial-darling Buzzfeed was not immune from a harassment claim. Business Insider reports that the digital media company has itself been investigating possible harassment claims within the company.

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Brett Maney is the Business Editor of MediaFile. She is a senior studying political communication. She has previously worked on governor’s races, senate campaigns, and in a variety of artisanal dessert shops. Her political musings can be found on Twitter @bryokom.